I purchased a 2018 Pilot Elite 4 months ago, and about 6 weeks ago, I started having the stalling issue. I have had 2 different start/stall problems, so I am not sure if they are connected or 2 different issues. The first issue I was leaving work, engine cold, started with no issue, pulled out my phone to check something before I started driving. Some extra lights caught my eye on the dash, and it was lit up like a christmas tree, and engine was off. I had been idling less than 2 minutes when this happened. The dash cycled through telling me that pretty much every system has failed. A coworker saw that I was still sitting there, and happened to have a scan tool and it gave me a P2101 ETCS Malfunction. Engine would restart and immediately die. Eventually it started and stayed idling, but there was no throttle response, and no shift response. After googling what was going on, with the car off, I tried starting again, and it fired right up, no lights, no faults, just like nothing happened. Over the next few days, it didn't happen again. Then, leaving a doctor appointment, I stopped at a stop sign to leave the parking lot, and it did the same thing, got it started after a few minutes, but it was in limp mode. Got back to work as it was a short distance at slow speeds. When I left work, no issue all the way home. The next day, no issues all day, then about half way home while driving, all the lights came on again engine shut off while going about 35 mph, it was automatically shifted to neutral so I coasted it into a parking lot off the road and started recording with my phone what was going on. That was the last time that issue has happened back on March 25th. The AIS "should" have only come into play during the second incident stopping at a stop sign.
After these initial 3 incidents, the pilot now stalls randomly at stop lights/signs or while slowing for corners. This happens with AIS enabled and disabled. It's 1 thing to have it stall out while at a stop, but the stalling while slowing for a corner (still moving at about 25 mph) is the bigger concern for me at this point. I have taken it to the dealership and they "couldn't duplicate" the issue as others have claimed. After picking it up from the dealership, drove it home with no issue. Later that evening I drove it about 20 miles to my part time job, still no issues. When leaving there, I had to stop and talk to my boss, and left it idling in the parking lot for a few minutes while I ran inside. When I came back out, it had died again, and didn't want to start as it acted like it was out of gas (was at a half a tank), finally got it started, and had no throttle. Turned everything off completely, waited a minute and then it started up like nothing. When it stalls out like this, the only lights that come on the dash is the battery light and the warning light. At first, the only thing that I was noticing was that it would only stall at about a half a tank, so I was keeping it filled up, and then it happened with a full tank, so that bit went out the window. I checked the battery during a start cycle, and it only drops to about 11.3 volts when starting. I have looked at the MAF, and it is clean, as well as the throttle body and idle air valve. So I am thinking it is an electrical/computer issue, and very well could be unrelated to this thread as my issue doesn't seem to be only with the AIS system.
This is very disappointing having purchased this as it was meant to be for my wife, but with her having bad anxiety (and worse while driving after a hit and run last year), I can't have her driving it and stalling out randomly. I thought this would be a nice treat as it has every feature we could ever want, along with a few that I don't care for. But I think this will be the last Honda product that I will purchase after this experience.
I have also contacted Honda Corporate and filed a complaint through NHTSA # 11424313
